


boy was my face red

by SavageNutella46



Series: Maribat One-Shots [12]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, Maribat - Fandom, Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: College AU, F/M, I DECIDED IM MAKING A SECOND CHAPTER TO THIS, Marinette is a hot mess, dont you, gets kinda saucy in the first chapter, its all because of dick, roommate au, second chapter is for resolution folks, you love me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-11
Updated: 2021-02-06
Packaged: 2021-03-15 20:21:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28694610
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SavageNutella46/pseuds/SavageNutella46
Summary: Marinette had never had any other intention than to see Dick happy.But, what if, he could be happy with her, too?She wouldn’t object to that.
Relationships: Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug/Dick Grayson
Series: Maribat One-Shots [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1882840
Comments: 106
Kudos: 170





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Scarlet_knight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scarlet_knight/gifts).



> First chapter really short—I know, but it sets the tone for what I have planned next chapter. Enjoy!

"What are you working on?" Marinette startled from her place on the chair, pulling a laugh from the man hovering behind her, and bringing a flush to her cheeks.

She had been sewing gloves, yellow and green wool gloves for Dick—which were supposed to have been a surprise, mind you—because he had been whining non-stop about the "constant chill in my fingers, Nettie!"

"Dick, you made me poke myself." Marinette frowned, and stared at the blood running down her pointer finger and creasing where appendage meets palm. She felt Dick's breath puff on the back of her neck as he bends down behind her, and internally tried not to scream.

"Oh. I'm sorry, Nettie. Would you like me to kiss it better?" She flushed again, practically hearing the smirk in his voice, and he laughs again, an obnoxious, loud laugh that's so contagious it has her chuckling with him. Marinette turned around to look at him, and rightfully so.

Dick's eyes were closed. His long lashes that cast an enviable glare from woman and curious stares from men casting shadows on his high cheek bones. His mouth was pulled in a wide, open smile. He looked so...beautiful.

So, so, different from a few months ago when she'd come back from class to their shared dorm and witnessed him holed up in his bed, dark, droopy bags under his eyes and a frown almost permanently placed on his mouth from when he'd broke up with Barbara Gordon.

Marinette had decided right then and there, that she would always be there for Dick. No matter who he was with at the moment, because, it made her happy when Dick was happy. And what more could one want?

Dick's laugh slowly died, and her's with it. Marinette should have forced herself right hen and there to tear her gaze away from his beautiful face, but she couldn't. Marinette's gaze was stuck on him.

(She would never stare at anything else, if given the chance.)

So, naturally, Dick opened his eyes, and focused on hers, staring right at him. Marinette should've looked away, anything, but she kept her gaze firmly on his, and in turn, his planted on hers.

Say something, quick.

"Did you use my straightener?" Dick grinned, and she blushed again. Not what she was going for, but she gave herself a pat on the back for it, anyway.

"How'd you notice? Was it my roots?" Dick dipped down to her level and planted his face right in front of hers—God, her face was so red—silently gesturing with his hands to feel his hair.

Marinette hesitantly dove her fingers in his hair and oh, it was soft. What conditioner did he use? She'd have to ask next time her mouth started working again.

It was strange, the air between them. She had never experienced anything like this before. It was all so...intense. Dick was staring right at her, his bright blue eyes meeting her own wide ones, and, they were definitely getting closer.

"You— _Uh_." Her stuttered words hung awkwardly in the air as she tried to get a coherent sentence out of her tongue-tied mouth. She was distantly aware of the extra weight put on her desk chair as Dick set his hands on the arms of the chair, almost locking her beneath him.

Her hands stopped moving in his hair, and for a moment, it felt as if everything froze. Dick had stopped moving with her hesitation, and peered deeper into her eyes, as if searching for something.

"Marinette." He whispered. And, _oh_.

She never thought her name could sound so _beautiful_.

Marinette swallowed thickly. "Yes?" She whispered back, the word coming out scratchy and broken from her throat.

Dick's eyes wandered down to her mouth, and jumped back up. He cleared his throat, and opened his mouth as if to say something—

“ _Dickhead_!” A loud slam of the front door opened, and Dick jumped up from his crouch in front of Marinette, and patted his shorts down. Dick winked at Marinette before turning, and walking out, shutting the door behind him.

Marinette stared at her hands, unbelieving.  
  


_Yes_ , that just happened. And, _no_ , she wasn’t dreaming.


	2. boy was his face glowing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is NOT a Barbara Gordon hate zone. I will not condone any slander to Barbara Gordon !!
> 
> WE LOVE BABS HERE!!

Marinette sighed and ran a hand through her hair.

Dick had sent a text message, and while the gesture wasn't uncommon, it was the context inside. The vague, two-worded message that settled unprecedented worry deep in her bones.

_Dickie: It's Barbara._

She hadn't responded. Of course she hadn't, because, why would she? How would she respond to something like that other than dropping everything at her part time job as a barista and come barreling home?

_Especially_ when it's about Barbara Gordon.

Barbara Gordon was everything she wasn't and more. Barbara was tall, red-headed, and beautiful, while Marinette continuously fell on the literal short end of the scale compared to her.

Barbara Gordon was exactly Dick's type. Smart, cunning, and played an important role in society.

And Marinette liked to make dresses.

—But, they had been having relationship problems, hadn't they? She'd witnessed the dismayed look on Dick's face he'd often had after hanging out with the red-haired woman. The slam of the door that so often abruptly broke the comfortable silence of their dorm when he'd come home after a fight.

"Don't think like that." She whispered to herself. Marinette was standing idly outside the heavy door that led to their dorm, stalling.

_Do it. Go inside. He's waiting_.

Marinette placed a shaky hand on the brass doorknob and waited for a sign. A text, or a tell-tale noise from inside the dorm.

Nothing.

She swung the door open and immediately, muffled sniffles from Dick's room filtered through her haze of disappointment, shaking the undertone of guilt-ridden excitement as she stalks down the hallway to his bedroom.

"Dickie?" No answer, just sniffles that continued to float through the air and thoroughly continue to crush her heart into tiny pieces. Her throat squeezed in anticipation, and her face crunched up.

Marinette knocked on his bedroom door hesitantly. "Can I come in?"

"Yeah." Dick's voice cracked pitifully in the middle of the word, and Marinette tightened her grip on his doorknob and swung the door open, quickly rushing to his side.

Dick looked like a mess. His long hair that was usually swept in place stuck out all over the place, some of it looked a little wet, as well. Dick was laying in his bed under rumpled sheets, clutching a blue striped pillow to his chest tightly, his face buried into the top of the tear-stained covering.

Marinette sighed, running a hand through his unkempt hair as his body shook with muffled sobs. "Dick, I'm _so_ sorry." Dick let out a slightly more audible sob when she started to rub his back.

He looked up, and, shit. Marinette's heart lodged itself in her already constricting throat.

There were dark circles the size of California resting under Dick's eyes. He peered up at her through red-rimmed eyes, and tears that quickly spilled over his eyelids when he blinked fast enough to rid them.

Worst of all, there was no spark of joy she always saw on his face, nor his eyes, nor his body language. There was not a single trace of warmth or recognition in his eyes, and it chilled her to the bone to see her best friend so affected by Barbara Gordon.

She wanted to strangle the red-haired woman in that very moment. Her throat squeezed with both hatred and guilt for letting such a woman break her best friend's heart.

"She—she broke up with me, Marinette-" Ouch, what did she do to deserve her full name? "—she _left_ me." Dick squeezed his eyes shut again, and crumpled into himself, his body rattling and shaking like a leaf from unrestrained sobs.

Marinette bit her lip and wrapped herself around Dick, squeezing her arms hard around his middle and burying her head into the crook of his neck. "She's a fool. You're amazing, Dick." Marinette whispered, almost inaudible.

—but he heard, she was sure, because he froze, and for a moment, she felt almost felt it was the wrong thing to say. Marinette had nothing else to say, so she tightened her arms around him, but, he turned around in her grip, loosening it slightly.

Dick stared at her, almost too intensely, and Marinette felt a flush rise to her neck, his sobs minutely subsiding, but not completely, tears starting to absently roll down his face, and hiccups fighting their way up Dick's throat.

"You—" Dick swallowed a hiccup, "You really mean that?" He stared at Marinette, with such a newfound intensity that almost made her choke, and it would have if it wasn't for the hurt lingering in his expression and the fat tears still racing down his pale cheeks.

Marinette floundered for a response, cornered by his hopeful, yet hurt expression. "Of course, Dickie. You—someone like that isn't worth your tears. You—" She smiled awkwardly, and reached for his limp hands, and squeezing. "Dick, someone like you...you deserve someone who knows your worth."

Because Dick was worth everything. Barbara was truly a fool to break up with him.

Dick audibly swallowed. He looked down at their hands, conjoined tightly, soft against one another, sans the permanent calluses on Dick's palm from acrobatics as a child.

Marinette rubbed his palm absently, humming to awkwardly break the stretching silence that seemed to envelope them at her words. Her stupid, stupid words; a sentence that surely made him internally scoff at her obvious pining.

But, suddenly, Dick was hugging her again. Her best friend's arms were wrapping tightly around her middle and squeezing just about the life out of her, murmuring to himself incoherently.

"— _ank you,_ thank you, thank you, you don't know how much that means to me." He was muttering to her.

Marinette's eyes widened at the warmth soaking into her shirt and realized he was crying again. "Oh, you're welcome, Dick."

" _I love you_."

Words so silent she'd forgotten to actually understand them instead of just hearing them, continuing to stroke his back softly.

The worst part about when your best friend gets their heartbroken, is the sudden extra person constantly clinging onto your arm and using all your hair appliances; and with the passing months, Dick had become her other half, quite literally.

"You're going to fry your hair at this rate." Dick grinned and shook his head, his alarmingly stubborn soft hair swinging around with the sudden motion and settling behind his neck, a tad overgrown so that it sat under the nape of his neck, but it was nice to run her hands through.

They were sitting on the couch, almost like conjoined twins with how their legs and shoulders seemed to plaster themselves together. Empty ice cream pints and various fast food takeouts littered the coffee table and couch around them as the television blared Hell's Kitchen in the background.

"If that means my hair looks good, then so be it." It really did, but she's hate to see the notion of his luscious locks last less than a millennia. Especially with how the moonlight currently reflected off of it, making him look almost angelic.

_Yes_ , her bestfriend was beautiful, and, _yes_ , she was jealous. And what about it?

Marinette chose to remain silent instead of quipping back; the bastard was not going to laugh at her again.

No, because when Dick laughed, angels sang, and when he laughed, she was reminded of her big fat crush on Dick Grayson.

She reached for his hand, and squeezed it tightly, stubbornly training her eyes on Gordon Ramsay yelling at a blue team chef for undercooking scallops instead of looking for a reaction in Dick. Marinette felt as if she would actually combust if she even looked in his general direction, her face flushing a deep red from the sheer silence to her left.

A few minutes passed, each one with a growing intensity in silence that lodged a heavy lump in her throat and squeezed the air out of her. Hell's Kitchen continued to drone on in the background, each scene providing a different tinted glow to their faces in the dark of the night.

Marinette was sure Dick could feel the damp sweat soaking her palms, the heat soaking through her hand to his. She was so sure he would pull away out of disgust—then his hands went slack in her hold.

Marinette stopped breathing. She turned her head to the side, slowly. It was hard to make out the details of his face underneath the absence of light, but his expression was calm, naturally relaxed. 

Dick was sleeping.

She swallowed harshly, the heavy ball of saliva easing its way down her throat and a symphony of relief flooding her nerves, flushing the red-hot embarrassment out of her system.

It would be so easy to tell him right now. To lift the heavy weight off her chest so she could breathe properly for the first time in two years. Marinette could tell him anything she wanted to and he wouldn't know. She ran her free hand through his hair slowly, relishing in the silky smooth glide of her hand in Dick's locks.

"Love you." She opted for, instead. It could be seen as painfully platonic, though her tone was thick and wavered at the end, the meaning of her words breaking through the seems of her poorly placed disguise.

She's in class, picking out a few fabrics on the rack for a shirt she so meticulously designed when he called.

Or, called out to her. In the middle of class.

Dick sprinted into the room, narrowly missing a full on concussion to a heavy clothing rack on his way in, bracing his hands on red knees to catch his breath once he had caught up to her.

Marinette cleared her throat, taking a sweep of the room with her eyes, and, yep, they were all looking at her and Dick; some with a knowing look on their face—damn you, Steph—and ones with utter curiosity.

"Uh," Marinette turned her attention back to the man crouching before her with wide eyes. "Dickie? You okay?" Dick wheezed in response, clutching his knees even harder.

"I," Dick gasped. "I ran...three miles—" Another wheeze. "To get to your class." He rushed out, straightening up with one last deep grasp for breath before fully opening his eyes at her, and, woah.

An unreadable expression on his face, but his eyes told a whole different story. Staring intensely, deeply into her own, they conveyed a message so strong it almost had her gasping for air.

(Not that she'd ever do that. What an overplayed cliche.)

An undertone of apology, although underwhelmed by the sheer amount of excitement and happiness that stretched his mouth from ear to ear in the perfect grin, she hadn’t seen this since—

(“ _Nettie!” The dorm door slammed with Dick’s arrival, the noticeable octave change in his voice giving away his rattling happiness._

_Marinette smiled from her lazy perch on their brown, holed up couch, spurred on by her best friend’s good mood to wash over her, too. “What happened, Dickie?” Dick bounded over to her, bright blue eyes shining even more with an unprecedented gleam, his shiny hair bouncing as he plopped down in front of her, bracing his hands on her shoulders._

_“You’ll never believe it!” Dick grinned toothily, squeezing her shoulders periodically as he stopped to laugh boisterously with his head hung low, hiding his expression._

_Marinette could feel his excitement seep into her, and grinned. “Tell me, Dickie.”_

_“I asked Barbara out, and she said yes!”_

_A static noise filled her ears. Marinette stopped breathing as Dick’s words hit her full on, momentarily stopping on their way past to slap and laugh at her face before continuing on their journey. She could feel the aggression climbing up her shoulders where Dick’s hands rested, beckoning to rip them off and tear him a new one._

_She couldn’t. He was so—_ )

Happy. Dick looked so happy, and for a moment, Marinette had almost forgotten how to speak.

“...Dick?” Had he found someone new, again? Did he come over all the way to design class Three miles away from their dorm to come and break her heart for the second time in the past two years? She’d waited to tell him, damnit, and it was slipping away again.

Just like last time. A shadow crept up on Marinette again, looming over her with words of doubt and uncertainty, clawing at her carefully sewn seams, tearing holes in her polyester resolve.

“Marinette, I—“ This was it. He’d tell her he was moving on again, and again would begin the vicious cycle of her forlorn feelings never being able to see the light of day.

“I love you.”

She’d never—

“What?” Marinette gaped dumbly.

Dick straightened up even more, if that was possible, and gripped both of her hands in his own, staring at her intensely, and repeated himself.

“I’m _so_ in love with you.” And just like that, a cacophony of emotions flooding through the gate, beckoning the dark shadow that looked over her, and, instead, a glimmer of hope, happiness.

She was aware her face must look somewhat similar to that of a fish, because Dick carried on, somehow gripping her hands even harder.

“I can’t believe I never realized, I—I’m so dumb!” Dick laughed, and it was the drop of a hat to unload an avalanche.

“You...love me?” Somewhat of an avalanche. Marinette couldn’t convey emotions as well as Dick could.

“After last night, I felt this—this type of _way_. I was thinking so hard this morning about you and, and—“

“I love you, too.” Marinette let herself grin with him, picking up onto his sheer stellar grip on her hands and squeezing back equally as hard.

And, yes, it felt amazing to openly admire his hair while Dick stared at her with the force of a million suns. She’d _earned this, damnit. Isn’t it nice to bury your hands in your new boyfriend’s hair while he kisses you with the force of a thousand suns?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And holy cow it took almost a month to update this. I can safely say it’s done, and, a weight off my shoulders!
> 
> Leave a comment for me to enjoy? (My only source of happiness these days.)

**Author's Note:**

> if you leave a comment I automatically love you


End file.
